Llontop demands darting eyes. 

Ash K. Tata’s staging divides this Anonymous Ensemble production’s means of expression equally downstage, so that you’re constantly maneuvering your gaze to take it all in. Even so, you’re bound to miss some of the nuances in their individuated harmony (can you say: Reconstructing’s polyphony, a fellow Under the Radar offering).  

Let’s run through Llontop’s means of expression. 

The primary vehicle of its abstract narrative: the subtitles on the center screen, translating Irma Alvarez-Ccoscco’s poetic monologuing (“monologue-poetry” is probably a more accurate description) about the Quechua.

But then, an image will be inserted as the backdrop for the subtitles…and sometimes not the same image as on the other two screens flanking the stage, creating a dialogue between them.

Half of the cinematography is created through close-ups of miniatures, with cinematographer Jessica Weinstein in plain view at a filming station.    

The other half is meaningfully-framed shots of the stage from various corners of Pregones’ auditorium, alternating between Alvarez-Ccoscco’s performance and the live band, who use non-instrument objects as instruments.

As for the potential dramaturgy of this partitioned blocking:

The Quechua have been dispersed all over the world, spiritually connected yet corporeally separate. Despite this movement, they stayed with their traditions, and we have to move our heads to grasp their totality.

We must work to see them, with individual details inevitably lost in pursuit of the whole.